


Late Night Confessions

by BanditHallows



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Good Parent Jessica Whitly, Hurt/Comfort, Mother-Son Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:34:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26973736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BanditHallows/pseuds/BanditHallows
Summary: “I should have known what he was because… I was once the girl in the box.“What started off as a simple yet honest apology for being the strenuous mother she was, the conversation soon became much more haunting as Jessica Whitly was forced to relive her darkest secret.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	Late Night Confessions

**Author's Note:**

> This may seem OOC at some points, but honestly, judging from the little details, the little interactions between the characters, the hidden emotions, I feel like this would really fit.  
> Jessica Whitly seems so cold and distant at some points during the show, but maybe that's just the years of trauma screaming out of her, I feel like she desperately tries to reach out to her children but just can't.  
> Anyways, enjoy reading :)

Long having abandoned the thought of getting any sleep that night, Malcolm sat at his kitchen counter, absentmindedly staring into the big nothing. The events of tonight kept vividly replaying on and on and on in his head. His sister’s face. The dead body. The flashing knife. He could all but feel the warmth of Endicott’s blood on his cheek, the smell of iron creeping up his nose. He knew he had to stop it, stop the thoughts from coming, he had to try breaking the intrusive thoughts, but he couldn’t muster the will or energy. All he could do was to sit there, drowning in his memories.

A hesitant knock at his door finally brought him back to reality. Glancing at his watch, he frowned. 3:43 am. Gil and Dani would be fast asleep now, and even if not, they wouldn’t have the audacity showing up unannounced, especially not in the middle of the night. Ains was securely kept away and his mother had her keys, never in a thousand years would she consider knocking.

After a second, soft knock made his way to his ears, this time sounding even more desperate than the first, he sight and quietly tapped towards the downstairs entrance door.

Upon opening it, he was greeted with a sight so unfamiliar, he hardly didn’t recognize her.

In front of him stood his mother, dressed in simple black pants and a washed out high school sweater, that formally belonged to him. Her face showed no sign of her usual, perfect makeup-masquerade, marking the bags under her eyes shine so prominently against her paper white skin.

Lacking her heels, only wearing flats, she suddenly seemed so much smaller than he ever remembered her.

After a short, awkward pause, he broke the silence: “Mother. What do I owe the questionable pleasure of your unexpected and utterly untimely visit?“

“I was…“, she stopped mid sentence, her eyes scurrying up and down the street, as she was nervously tucking at the edges of her sleeves. “I was, uhm, you know, I was…“, she tried again, but also this time was not able to finish her sentence, her words stuck in her throat, silently watching him with wide eyes.

Sighing again, Malcolm stepped aside, letting her in. “By all means, feel right at home. I figure you must have forgotten your keys?“, he remarked, half heartedly trying to reestablish their normally so sarcastic interaction.

Never had he seen his mother so distraught, not even the evening his father had been arrested. She had always remained stoic and collected, so seeing her like this made him shudder even more than Ainsley’s attack. What on earth was wrong with this day.

As no answer came, he tried again. “What would you like to drink? Whisky, Bourbon, Vodka?“

That at least seemed to catch her attention, as her head snapped up. “No thank you, darling, I’m trying to stay off the self medication right now, I need a clear mind. And the alcohol has done enough damage as it is.“

Seeing her son raise an eyebrow at this statement, she quickly added “You know what, I’m sorry. Coming here was a mistake, this is clearly not the moment for talks, I didn’t want to interrupt your… night. I’ll just go, we’ll talk the next days, ok?“

But before she was able to reach the door, Malcolm caught hold of her arm.

“Mother. You never knock, you always use your key. You always have a drink. You never cared if your timing was appropriate. Did you want to check if I was still alive? Or out there murdering kittens?! What is wrong?“

“Nothing is _wrong_ , I just wanted to see if you were sleeping well… or were up for a little conversation. But we don’t have to, if you don’t feel like it, it was a… horrible, horrible day for the both of us and I would absolutely understand, if…“, Jessica started rambling again, which made Malcolm narrow his brows even further.

“I have time, I wasn’t planning on sleeping anyways“, he interrupted, leading her towards the couch, “what did you want to have your _little conversation_ about?“ Now, this could be anything, knowing his mother. From upping his medication to going inpatient to blind-dating a woman she deemed perfect for him. So, sitting down on the opposite side of the couch, he couldn’t help but feel slightly curious. Everything about this visit was so unlike his mother, maybe she would surprise him.

And that she did.

“I came here to apologize.“, she said shortly, looking him straight in the eyes.

Inhaling deeply, she continued, before her confused son even got the chance to interrupt her. She had a speech prepared and as usual, she was ready to deliver it.

“I’m aware that you and your sister would never consider me mother of the year, and I can see why.

I hover. A lot, admittedly. I may have disrespected some boundaries within the last couple of years and fussed over things I’m not particularly wanted to be involved in. I see that.

But I won’t apologize for that, specifically.“

“Oh, of course you wouldn’t“, Malcolm huffed quietly, earning a displeased look from his mother in return.

“You are my child and I am scared to death that anything could potentially happen to you, don’t you understand?“, she shook her head sadly, before continuing. “Your father was… such a gruesome man, he hurt my perfect, little boy! You need to sleep chained to your bed because of him which in return results in me never getting a restful night, constantly worrying you might hurt yourself! I know my daily morning visits and calls annoy you beyond words, but I need check on you to see if you are still alive or somewhere hospitalized because you strangled yourself with your wristbands!

So yes, I know I am annoying, I know I’m intrusive, I know I’m overstepping. Trust me, I know!

But I literally can’t help myself and stop that.

I have been talking about this… issue of mine with my therapists. Every one of them, that is. Realizing I let my kids alone with a serial killer for so long may have caused me to become a tat overprotective of the two of you.

When you were born I swore I would never let anyone hurt you and I have already once failed so fatefully at that, I’m simply afraid of missing out on something again!

And I am so, so sorry that you feel overwhelmed by that, annoyed, cornered, whatever. I don’t want you to feel like you should keep your distance just to get rid of me. Please believe me, I always had the best intentions for the both of you…

I was so scared of losing any of you, that you would want to push me out of your lives, that I completely managed to do that on my own.“

For a moment they both sat completely still.

“I know“, Malcolm said slowly. Of course he knew. He was a profiler after all, this wasn’t a too unusual behavior after a traumatic event this extent. And to a degree, he could understand her, being faced with some of the same problems himself when in came to his little sister.

But hearing her say this out loud, admitting this to him… it helped him feel at least a little better.

Having discussed that topic in therapy a lot and how it had stained their relationship, he knew this wouldn’t solve any of the issues they had. But it could at least be a base to start from, a base to communicate from.

“I’m sorry for constantly giving you a hard time. I… understand where you are coming frombut I still can’t… it’s complicated.“, he finally sighed.

She smiled defeatedly and slowly reached over to hold his hand, hovering for a second above his, then insecurely drawing back without touching him.

Sighing sadly, he stretched himself over the couch to grab her hand, squeezing it gently.

Just as he was about to say they were gonna be ok and would make it through this mess, his profiling skills unraveled a gruesome suspicion.

“You know what happened today was not your fault, right, mother?“, he looked at her, eyes narrowing again, an unpleasant habit he picked up from his therapist, “This was Ainsley’s decision, and her’s alone, you did nothing wrong with the both of us. That death wasn’t on you, you didn’t make her become a murderer!“

“Of course I did.“, she huffed defeatedly, “Not in short sight of course, no, but in the long run. My… questionable taste in men nearly ruined this family! Twice! I fell for the same type of man. Twice! Now if that’s not some kind of sad record to be broken, I don’t know what is.“ Bitter sarcasm dripping from every word, she angrily pushed her chin forward, lips tightly pressed together. “I loved the wrong man… and that’s why my baby became a murderer“, she hissed.

“Well, you couldn’t have known with Endicott, he tricked everyone. And Dr. Whitly… Love makes blind and people change. I mean… how was he when you got to know him?“, admittedly, that question had been on his mind for about 20 years. She never talked about it - ever.

„Difficult, he was… well, let’s go with difficult.“, she shook her head slightly. “When your father and I first met… everything was so different! I was… I was just so young and we were so happy!“, she started again, with a watery smile on her lips, “Your father… he could be such a charming man, so polite and attentive, treating me like I was the only girl in his whole universe, a universe full of roses and love and happiness.

Sometimes, he also had… well, he had… darker days. Days, when he’d screw up an exam or said something wrong in front of a professor, that would always bother him so much. He’d come home in this… horrible mood of his, and… have his needs.“ Disgustedly she twisted her face. “He’d never even asked how I felt or if I was up to any of this, he would just… look at me with his merciless eyes, grab me like a doll and do whatever he wanted. In those moments, he was like a different person, he never cared about me or if he hurt me, this was only about him. He was so much stronger than me, terrified as I was I never would have stood a chance. After the first two or three times, I didn’t even try to defend myself anymore. Afterwards he just picked a fight out of nowhere. He’d scoop so low, his words hurt even more than his fists… You know, how charming he could be? Well, he turned out to be just as vengeful and scathing.“ She laughed bitterly, wiping away a tear in the process.

The silence that followed was almost crushing the both of them.

Jessica, so caught up in her memories, and Malcolm, still trying to wrap his head around the story he just heard. His mother had always been such an independent and fierce woman, for the world he couldn’t understand, how this could have happened. An unpleasant voice invaded his thoughts again. “All smoke, no fire“, had Endicott stated about his mother. Maybe he was right. And this strong facade was in fact no more than that - a facade she kept up to protect herself from ever having to relive all of that again.

“But he always apologized, you know?“, Jessica’s voice broke through the dark cloud between them, “every single time he said he didn’t mean to. He’d cry and swear to be better, how he didn’t deserve me but he would do anything for me. Every time he said it would never happen again, each time more desperate than the last, and every time I believed him.

I had to believe him. I had no other choice but to believe in the half hearted promises he gave me, I couldn’t get away. Nobody would have believed me anyways. Nobody wanted to see the monster he was.“

“Oh yes“, Malcolm laughed darkly, nearly spitting his words, so full of rage, “he was always the perfect man, wasn’t he.“

“But by keeping quiet, I helped protect him… By keeping quiet I was nearly as bad as him.

You, Ainsley, all these women your father murdered… This was my fault as much as his, I should have known.“ She looked down at her lap, helplessly watching her tremors grow worse. “I should have known.“, she whispered again, closing her eyes.

“Mother, don’t do this to you“, Malcolm tried to get her attention, “you could not have known. He was the bad guy. I know, what you went through was more than anyone should endure, but this…“ - “No, you don’t. You don’t know and that’s the point!“, his mother grabbed his arm almost painfully, looking him so intensely in the eyes, he instinctively flinched back a bit.

“I should have known _what_ he was because… I was once _the girl in the box_.“

“You were what?!“ Seeing his mother jump at his loud voice, Malcolm could have slapped himself for his hasty exclamation, but he couldn’t stop himself. Terrified, he watched the memories of this fatal evening come back to him, his mother following him in the workroom, her horrified expression upon seeing the box, her completely panicked voice as she dragged him out of that room… What seemed to him like an all too suspicious, murderer-like behavior just a couple of months ago, all made sense now. Being confronted with that box again… made her fear for her families’ lives.

“It was when I was pregnant with you, during one of his intern years… when he lost his first patient.“, tears falling freely down her cheek, she stared speaking so fast, as if even her words tried to escape the horrors that were about to follow.

“He came home that night so… angry and full of hate. I had never seen him this way before and that moment was the first time I really thought he was gonna kill me. Kill _us_! I ran, I tried to lock myself in our bathroom, maybe he would calm down, leave or whatever I hoped he’d do. But he was so strong… He just knocked the door down like it was nothing, pulling me out and started throwing me around. He didn’t even care about hurting you, all he wanted was seeing me bleed… so I fought back, I kicked and punched at all I could see. Well, turned out this was kind of a big mistake.“ Silently she shook her head, absentmindedly reaching out for Malcolms hand again. “I don’t really remember what happened next, he must have hit me with something, everything was just a blur. He picked me up and carried me downstairs, where the air went colder and colder and when he finally let me down, I saw him closing the lid of this damn box and everything went dark. The box was so small around me, I couldn’t really move, all I could smell was blood. I didn’t know where it was coming from, I felt you kicking against me and in that moment the only thing I knew was that I had to stay alive to protect my baby boy. I must have been in there for hours… maybe even days, I don’t know. I could just lay there and wait for him to come down and kill us. And I honestly believed he planned on doing so. I don’t know why he never went through with it.“

She sniffled again, roughly wiping the tears from her face, staring into a distance her son couldn’t even imagine.

“After that… _incident,_ nothing like this ever happened again. I just somewhen woke up

in our bed, breakfast next to me, as if nothing ever happened, he even stitched my wound on the head and had the audacity to draw a heart on my bandage!

When he came home that next night ,he became the perfect, ever loving husband, no matter what I wanted, he made sure I’d get it.

And when you born, he mutated to the the perfect, ever loving father, oh you and Ainsley were the center of his world.

Maybe I thought the box-incident had been his wake-up call, a moment so bad he’d think about his behavior and actually change… Maybe I thought he was seeing other women, I don’t know what I thought. Maybe I didn’t even care. I was just so… incredibly relieved he wouldn’t leave out his anger on any of us that I never questioned anything. That I never chose to noticed anything.“

“So… back then, that’s what you meant when you said I wouldn’t know what my father was capable of?“ Not trusting her voice, Jessica just nodded her head, making more tears fall down her cheeks.

“Oh Mom, I’m so sorry“, Malcolm breathed. Not being able to stand the sight of his utterly broken mother in front of him, he quickly closed the distance between them, pulling her in a tight embrace.

“But why did you let him treat you like that? Why didn’t you run?“, he whispered, as he buried his face in the crook of her neck.

Another sob shook both their frames, his mother desperately trying to calm herself enough to speak again

“He was the only person I had left“, she answered after a while, gently pushing her son back to look him in the eyes, her hand cupping his chin.

“I was basically still a kid and my parents just adored him, if I had left him, especially being pregnant with his child, they would’ve abandoned me.

And in terms of custody, he would have worked his little magic and charmed the jury so I’d have lost you, too… And I couldn’t risk losing you, Malcolm, I just couldn’t! You were my baby boy and I wanted to protect you with all I had… I really thought I did the best for you and would be able to shield you from his monstrous side!“

Her voice growing bitter and louder as she spoke, she got up and marched up and down the carpet: “But instead, he nearly murdered you, nearly kills you in your sleep every day over and over again, he ruined your life, he ruined Ainsley’s life, because of him my babygirl became a murderer, he just… he just broke us and this is entirely my fault, I should have fought harder, I should have …“, abruptly she came to a halt in the middle of his living room, “…he should have just killed me, too, before I even got the chance to drag you both into this.“ Her last sentence was nothing more than a whisper, but still cut the silence like a dagger.

“No, Mom, no“, Malcolm sounded as broken as she looked, as he staggered over to her, hugging her tight. He felt like a little kid again, clinging to her like that, but right now he didn’t care.

“I love you, you know that, right?“, he murmured, as he nuzzled into her embrace, “I know I don’t say it as often as I probably should, but I do! And I’m just so thankful for having you as my mother. For always being there for me, for always having my back.“

A smile crossed her face, it was a sad smile and only for a little while, but still present. “I know baby boy, I know…“

By the time they sat down on the couch again, the sun was already beginning to rise, immersing the usually gloomy looking apartment in a warm, almost soothing light.

Jessica knew that she had a maximum of 5 hours, until her son would be painfully awakened by his night terrors again, thrashing around, probably leaving her with a black eye at best, maybe even a couple of broken bones. But right at this moment, she couldn’t care less. All that mattered now, was having her little boy safe in her arms, feeling the steady rising of his chest against her, while she combed her fingers through his hair.

And maybe tonight, just tonight, her own demons would leave her alone.


End file.
